Sinking of Jacinto City
The Sinking of Jacinto City was the turning point in the Locust War. With the Locust Horde suffering from massive losses and a damaged infrastructure from the Lightmass Offensive, the Horde decided that the only way to defeat the humans was to attack their last bastion of hope: Jacinto City. With Ketor Skorge using the Riftworm to destroy the cities and military installations around Jacinto, this led the COG High Command to regroup and make a counterattack: Operation: Hollow Storm. During the Operation, Sgt. Marcus Fenix of Delta Squad found the files within the Locust Command Center on his father, Professor Adam Fenix who theorized that sinking the city of Jacinto would cause the surrounding water to fill the Hollows, drowning all life underground. The Locust planned on using this information to destroy the Lambent after they evacuated to the surface. However, Sgt. Fenix proposed sinking the city first before the Locust could evacuate and the majority of the Locust Horde would drown in the sinking of Jacinto City. Prelude to the Sinking Operation: Hollow Storm before attacking Landown]] Since the Lightmass Offensive failed to kill the Locust Horde in the Hollows, Coalition High Command theorized that an attack on the Inner Hollows via Landown to destroy the Locust home front would end the war once and for all. The COG forces moved out of Jacinto and into the staging grounds for the Assault on Landown, taking heavy losses along the way. The Gears managed to capture Landown and enter the Inner Hollows by using the Grindlifts, bringing the Locust War to the Locust themselves. During Operation: Hollow Storm, Delta Squad discovered the Locust plans for sinking Jacinto and the Lambent threat to the Locust Horde.Gears of War 2: Act 2 High Command theorized from the late Adam Fenix's data that if the COG was to sink Jacinto before the Locust could evacuate the Hollow beneath it, they could destroy the Locust. However, this potential victory would require the sacrifice of humanity's last stronghold.Gears of War 2: Act 4 The Sinking All Out Attack The race was now on to see who would sink Jacinto first. Queen Myrrah sent a massive force to destroy any Gears and civilians left in the defense of Jacinto. All around the city, the COG fought desperately against the overwhelming Locust forces and were soon engaged in hand-to-hand combat as the Gears thought that they would have nowhere to go if Jacinto fell. The fighting got progressively more brutal and the Locust began to gain the upper-hand as the King Ravens were mostly evacuating the civilians so the Reavers had a free reign to attack the COG wherever they liked as the anti-air guns were either left behind in Ephrya or under Locust control. The Gears were facing defeat and the Locust just kept on coming. Soon, the Downtown district came under heavy assault as the Brumaks were deployed to clear the way for an all out final push on the COG holdouts. The COG Downtown consisted of Gears, Centaurs and the few Ravens that the COG could spare. The Locust force at the Downtown firefight was staggering as they had Grinders, Boomers, Drones, Reavers and two Brumaks. It seemed that the COG wouldn't be able to hold on to their precarious position of control of the situation. Heavy street-to-street fighting erupted within the city as the Locust, emerging from a massive sink hole carried a coordinated attack out on the Coalition COM tower from Cooper Street alongside the Grapplers on the South platform. The Gears in the surrounding streets outside the COM tower were brutally killed as the Locust pushed forward by using the Grinders and Maulers to quickly gain ground and cover the Drones and Grapplers. At the COM tower, the Gears along with Marcus Fenix, Dom Santiago and Col. Hoffman prepared the defenses and held out against a constant stream of Locust forces until the two Brumaks arrived, but Sgt. Fenix quickly overcame them with mortars. With the attack foiled by Delta Squad and the other Gears, Dom and Marcus commenced a two-man counterattack into the sink hole, leaving Baird and Cole to join them later with a Lightmass Bomb on a Raven. Dom and Marcus managed to wipe the large numbers of Locust troops out once in the sink hole by using a hijacked Brumak.Gears of War 2: Act 5: Aftermath Jacinto's End After making their way directly underneath Jacinto, they used the Brumak's weapons to destroy the three underground columns, opening holes in the surface large enough for the Ravens to fly in with the Lightmass Bomb and recover Dom and Marcus. Losing control of the Brumak as it started to react to the Imulsion, Dom and Marcus escaped onto Baird's Raven, but not before the Brumak knocked the Raven carrying the Lightmass Bomb into the Imulsion. With their plan now in ruins, Marcus realized that the Brumak is turning Lambent and becoming explosive. With approval from Command, the Ravens circled the Brumak underground while the Gears targeted it with the Hammer of Dawn. After several hits on the Lambent Brumak, the Ravens evacuated the Hollow and Jacinto as the Brumak exploded, destroying the city's foundation along with it. Jacinto quickly collapsed, allowing the sea water to pour into the Inner Hollows, wiping the majority of the Locust forces stationed there as well as the advancing Lambent army out. Mass Evacuation Every single King Raven, ship and vehicles poured into all exits from Jacinto City in the mass evacuation heading for nowhere.Gears of War: Jacinto's Remnant pg 7 But, Chairman Prescott ordered all Coalition forces to head to Port Farrall without Col.Hoffman's knowledge.Gears of War: Jacinto's Remnant pg 8 The Chairman's King Raven landed on the CNV Sovereign, a helicopter carrier and flagship of the fleet. Outcome With 30% of Jacinto's citizens and Gears lost in the evacuation, High Command decided to move what was left to Port Farrall, an abandoned COG base. Realizing the logistical nightmare that they are in, a winter environment with the majority of the base rundown and setting a refugee camp up in the cold, the COG decided to look for a new base of operations while dealing with the Locust stragglers and Stranded infiltration of the camp. After finding supplies in the catacombs of the port and destroying all of the feral dogs there, the COG began thinking that the worst was over with a large quantity of ammo and food discovered. Unfortunately, the Locust forces attacked the civilians from the very same catacombs, killing many of them at the food center while what was left of the navy was collecting the rest of the Imulsion from Merrenat Naval Base. This eventually forced the COG to move to Vectes, an island on the other side of an abyssal trench where the Locust could not dig to and they are safe from further attacks and could rebuild. While the Locust survived the sinking, the Horde was decimated and degenerated into the Savage Locust while some became the Queen's Guard, serving the last surviving Locust leader, Queen Myrrah. References